Henry Fritts, Revolutionary War veteran

There is no military flag holder at the grave of Henry Fritts (d. 1829), but do some quick arithmetic and you wonder: Where was Henry Fritts in 1776?

According to Abstract of Graves of Revolutionary Patriots, Volume 2 by Patricia Law Hatcher (via Ancestry.com), Mr. Fritts, who was maybe 18 years old in 1776, served in the American Revolutionary War.

Henry Fritts
Died march
The 27 1829
Aged 71 years
This is a beautiful gravestone that has aged fairly well. Look at the decorative detail!

Look even more closely and you can read an epitaph—or part of one—at ground level.

The tall the wise the
R[---]d head Shall lie

Although we cannot see the complete epitaph, it appears to have been taken from an Isaac Watts hymn:

Hark! from the tombs a doleful sound;
My ears, attend the cry;
“Ye living men, come view the ground
Where you must shortly lie.

“Princes, this clay must be your bed,
In spite of all your towers;
The tall, the wise, the rev’rend head
Must lie as low as ours!”

Great God! is this our certain doom?
And are we still secure?
Still walking downward to our tomb,
And yet prepare no more?

Grant us the powers of quick’ning grace,
To fit our souls to fly,
Then, when we drop this dying flesh,
We’ll rise above the sky.

Fancher Cemetery, Delaware County, Ohio